Twilight Serenade, page 27
part #6 of Earth Song Series
“The planetary shield, Bjorn?” Minu asked.
“Yeah, great idea. We should build it.”
“We were,” Jasmine pointed out, “until you stopped construction to change the emitter configuration.” He looked mystified.
“Bjorn,” Minu said, a little annoyed. “Why did you change the specs?”
“Oh,” he said, as he grabbed a tablet and started tapping on it. It wasn’t his, so none of his files were there. “Oh, I seem to have deleted everything by mistake!”
Cherise gently retrieved her tablet, reached into Bjorn’s holster, took his out and put it in his hands.
“Here it is!” the scientist crowed and accessed the files. He sent details to the meeting room’s computers, and they popped up on the displays.
The shield station looked remarkably like the power station around Dervish, for good reason. The energy gathering apparatus was similar. It would absorb the radiation coming from their dying star and convert it to usable plasma, which would power a shield far beyond the apparatus’s gathering range, effectively acting like a forward deflection shield on a starship. Radiation from Bellatrix would be shunted around the planet.
The display of the simple station changed to something much more robust. It had much more space and additional facilities that looked very familiar to Minu and Lilith. “Are those weapons hard points?” Lilith asked.
Bjorn nodded and grinned as he examined the design. Then he frowned and began making notes. Jasmine moaned.
“Bjorn,” Minu said before he started to redesign the entire station, “why the weapons points?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” he asked. She shook her head. “I’ve reviewed your reports on the mission to Dervish. The power station was unarmed.”
“And therefore vulnerable,” Lilith said, snapping her fingers and nodding. “You may be elderly and somewhat deranged, but you have a very good point.”
“Thanks!” he cackled, then went back to making notes.
“He has a point,” Lilith said, “leaving the planetary shield unarmed might be short sighted on our part, especially since it is so far from the planet, and we could easily remedy that oversight at this early stage. We could easily relocate salvaged ship-class weapons from Aether, as the components are designed to fit through a portal.”
Minu looked at Bjorn and smirked. “Bjorn, in the future, could you let us in on these ideas before you unilaterally change a design?” He grinned and shrugged. Minu made a note on her tablet: Get Ted to supervise Bjorn’s design work. “Lilith, may we have your report, please?”
“First,” Lilith said, “I’ve deployed six Eseel just outside our star system. As agreed, we now receive intelligence reports on a secure data channel. Acting on advice from the Squeen, we’ve encrypted that data with algorithms provided by the Tog. My calculations indicate it would be nearly impossible for a ship to make it through without being detected.”
“Are we still planning to deploy our own sensor net?” Minu asked.
“The deployment is almost complete,” Cherise said.
“We mostly used local contractors for assembly, which slowed things down a little, but we figured having less noses in the pie would decrease the chances of someone figuring out what we’re building,” Lilith said.
“Being blind is a bigger risk. Anything else, Lilith?”
“Another Kaatan will be ready for service, once we prepare the CI being used in the Fiisk for return to it. The CI has volunteered to remain where it is, pending crew training for service on the Fiisk. I’ve also completed my review of our second encounter with the super-Kaatan battle riders, and I’ve concluded they are indeed a new design. Their operation is tactically perfect, but it does not match the People’s standard operating procedures. An unknown force is operating these ships.”
“Any insight as to who it might be?” Dram asked. “We’ve reviewed the after action reports. Their timing is quite fortuitous.”
“No clue, sir. It is clear they are not willing to ally themselves with us, but they have aided us on two occasions.”
“They are watching your movements closely and seem to arrive just when you need them,” Jasmine noted.
“Agreed,” Lilith said, nodding. “I’m confident they don’t know about Aether, though.”
“Why is that?” Dram asked.
“Because there would be some evidence of their ships in the area,” Lilith said. “I have ships monitoring the edge of the nebula and have detected no vessels within several light years.”
“The Council appreciates your information,” Minu said. Lilith nodded in reply.
Minu stood and spoke to the assembled Council. “Almost three years ago, I brought to the Council the subject of our position with the Tog, and I requested they vote on our Awakening, freeing us from the Tog’s legal stewardship.”
There was total silence around the chamber. Minu gazed at them intently. None of them, not even Minu’s closest friends, expected her to revisit this now.
“The Council voted no. Only three of you sat on that Council,” she said, looking at Jasmine, Bjorn and Dram. “And there were two less Council members than there are now. I was never told who voted for or against the motion, only that it was defeated.” Dram started to speak, but she held up her hand. “It might be within my rights as First to review the record, but I don’t want to know. That was then, this is now.
“I, Minu Groves, First Among the Chosen, formally request a vote of the Chosen Council. I move that we petition the Concordia for our Awakening.”
* * *
When Minu returned to her office, Ariana was pacing the nursery floor, holding Mindy in one arm, gently swinging her back and forth, cooing to her and singing a song Minu didn’t recognize. Aaron sat in a recliner, snoring quietly.
“She just woke up, First,” the older woman said and smiled.
“Ariana, please call me Minu.”
“As you wish, First.”
Mindy turned her head at her mother’s voice and held out her arms. “Am, ma, ma, ma!” she said and smiled from ear to ear, showing her first, shiny, white teeth.
“Hi, baby girl!” Minu said and went over to take her daughter. “That’s almost a mama!”
“Almost, ma’am.”
“She slept the whole meeting?”
“Yes, the whole time. She didn’t even wake up when your husband came in. He worked on some sort of design for a few hours before falling asleep.”
Minu glanced at the wall as Mindy began nursing. The design was the Phoenix FTL he’d been spending all his time on. Apparently, Cherise had cataloged dozens of wrecked Eseel with functional drives in the Aether debris field. They were being salvaged and sent through the portal to Bellatrix, then on to Groves Industries. The new Phoenix would be true starships, the first made almost entirely by man, except for the faster than light drives, shield generators, and weapons, of course.
She could see he’d made them quite a bit bigger. At over 150 meters long with a considerable cargo hold, they were no longer shuttles, but small starships. She couldn’t understand all his technical jargon, but they looked to be fast, too. Maybe not as fast as the Kaatan, but damned fast. Next to the name was a digital note written with his finger, “Prometheus-class.”
“My husband has a thing for fire, it seems,” she said quietly.
“Excuse me, ma’am?”
“Oh, nothing, Ariana. Just musing. Thanks for taking care of Little Bit. Did she eat anything?”
“A bit, ma’am. She prefers your milk, I think.” Ariana was not only an incredible personal assistant, but a natural nanny. She had eight children, so that wasn’t a surprise.
“You’ve been a tremendous help with Mindy,” Minu told her. “I can’t possibly thank you enough.”
Minu sat in the other recliner and nursed the baby until she was finished, then bounced her on her knee. Mindy squealed and giggled.
Ariana picked up her tablet. “Anything else before I go?”
“Yes, there is something, but it can wait for tomorrow.”
“Yes, First, go right ahead.”
“I just moved a file named Awakening from the secure area on the computer. Inside are instructions for assembling a mission to Nexus and outlines for press releases to the civilian news services. Will you please start on that tomorrow?”
“Certainly, First. Is something big happening?”
“Only the biggest event in human history since we arrived on Bellatrix.”
“I see,” Ariana replied deadpan. “Well, then, I’ll be heading home, ma’am.”
“Good night, Ariana.”
“Good night, First.”
The door slid closed behind her, and Minu reached down to brush Mindy’s black hair off her forehead. The little girl watched her mother intently with her inquisitive green eyes. “You get to take another space trip,” she said. Without realizing it, Minu began humming the same melody she’d heard Ariana singing when she came in.
“Are we all going this time?” Aaron asked. Minu glanced at him and smiled at his bleary eyed expression.
“Without a doubt,” she said.
“Excellent,” Aaron replied and picked up his tablet to continue where he’d left off on the design. “I always wanted to see Nexus.”
“You assumed the vote would succeed?” Minu asked peevishly. “You left as soon as I announced it.”
“There isn’t much they won’t give you,” Aaron said, moving a series of heat sinks to a different area of the hull. “Everyone knows we’ve outgrown the Tog. Hell, we’re more of a threat to them than an asset.”
“Threat? What do you mean?”
“We’re practically in a state of open space warfare with three other species. What do you think will happen to the Tog if this escalates?”
“They have ships,” she reminded him as she tickled Mindy’s tummy.
“Not many, or we’d have run into them out there. They’re probably watching all this, shadowing us here and there.”
“Maybe these battle riders are theirs?” Minu speculated.
“Lilith doesn’t think so, and I agree. Fighting isn’t the Tog’s thing, and those battle riders are top notch combat vessels.”
“Still, we can’t rule out the Tog’s being involved with those other ships, somehow.”
“That’s true,” Aaron agreed.
Minu wandered out of the nursery and into her office. Rain pattered against the huge moliplas window that overlooked the magnificent view of the equatorial sea. Outside, a summer storm was building, and she saw the last of the Peninsula fishing ships racing toward port. A lightning bolt forked across the sky, its surreal light strobing into the office, throwing faces into stark profile.
Mindy jerked and looked around at the sudden flash of light. A moment later, the entire fort rumbled from the fury of the storm. Minu was afraid Mindy would cry at the harsh crack of thunder, but as it rumbled through its peak and began to diminish, she seemed to consider the sound, then grunted and continued trying to pull Minu’s single golden pip off her sleeve.
“I guess you’re a child of the storm,” Minu told her.
There was a knock at the door, then it slid open. Minu looked up from her desk and saw Dram stick his head in. “Got a minute?”
“Always,” Minu said and gestured for him to come in.
He glanced at the open door to the nursery. “Can we have a private conversation?”
“Aaron?”
“Yes?”
“First stuff. Can we have a few?”
“Sure,” he said and got up to close the door. “Hey, Dram.”
“Aaron,” Dram replied in his deep voice. “Sorry.”
“Not a problem,” Aaron said and held up the tablet. “I’m working anyway.”
Dram thanked him again as he closed the door. “You should convince him to come back.”
“That won’t happen,” Minu said. “Private life agrees with him.”
“Still, he’d be an asset, and you could convince him.”
“I could,” Minu agreed, “but I won’t.”
“Fair enough,” Dram said, crossing the room to the desk. It was the same desk her father used in his office in Steven’s Pass. “May I?” he asked and gestured at the chair.
“Please,” she said. “Mindy likes it when I walk, so I’ll stay standing, if you don’t mind.”
He sat and watched her bounce Mindy on her hip as she walked around the room. “I wish I’d had time for that sort of stuff.”
“You’re not that old,” Minu chuckled.
“Tell that to the ladies,” he said. He felt more like her uncle than her second-in-command; however, he was a brilliant Scout and was almost universally loved among the Chosen. “Chriso only had you in his office a handful of times.”
“I remember a few times,” she said. “But you didn’t come by to talk about old times.”
“No, I didn’t.” He paused for a minute, taking stock of the office and noting some of the holographic pictures she’d decorated with. “You know I was the one who derailed the last vote on Awakening.” He didn’t at her when he said it.
“Why?” was all she could ask. She could feel her anger beginning to rise.
“I had two reasons,” Dram said. “One I can’t share with you now, but maybe someday.” He had a distant, almost sad, look on his face. “The other has nothing to do with you.”
“Nothing to do with me? You shot me in the ass with that move. Do you know how much further along we’d be, if you’d supported that motion?”
“Do you know how much worse off we’d likely be, if I had?” His question caught her more off guard than his admission that he was the one who had stopped her. “The Council vote was about 50-50 for Awakening. We all saw the potential, but some also saw the risks. And, as you you know, those risks are great.”
Minu nodded.
“We were seeing real profits from our farming ventures and the credits the Rangers were bringing in, and the older species were making it hard for us to get any good tech for projects. Even without the Tog’s protection, we were small enough that we weren’t a likely threat, as long as the big boys didn’t realize we were the ones gallivanting around space, getting in their faces and blowing up their ships.”
“Then why—”
Dram held up his huge hand. “Please, let me finish?”
Minu relented, and he continued, “Jacob rode the fence, as usual. He never was much for hard decisions, and the ones he did make tended to be bad ones. As long as he waffled, I didn’t commit.
“It was Pagalio who pushed Jacob over. He pointed out that if we became Awakened, we could sell all that we’d learned about training the Rangers, as well as the shock rifles, to the alien species.”
“That rotten son of a bitch,” Minu hissed.
Dram nodded. “You would have gotten what you wanted, but you would have lost everything. Jacob was on board, so I came out against it. I sent a quiet message to Bjorn to get him to follow my lead, and the motion was defeated. Jacob was pissed. He even accused me of having an affair with you!” They both laughed.
Dram stood up and turned to watch the raging storm. The sea battered the ancient cliff the fort stood on like a monster tearing into its foe. No craft were out on the waters; that would have been suicide.
“I couldn’t let Jacob do it,” Dram told her. “Not to you and not to the Rangers. And giving away the shock rifles was more stupidity than even he should have been capable of.”
“I felt so betrayed,” she admitted.
“I know you did, and I’m sorry. I hope you understand now.”
“I do and thank you. It did hurt, but I understand.” Dram stood up to leave.
“Dram?” He stopped and looked at her. “Any word on Jacob?”
“He turned up a while ago at his family estate in the steppes. They have a few hundred hectares of good hops land out there. But a month ago, he disappeared again. No one knows where he went.”
“Could he have gotten off-world?”
Dram’s eyes narrowed as he considered the question. He had worry lines she hadn’t noticed before. And from the look of the sparse stubble on his head, he didn’t have much hair left to shave.
“I don’t believe so.”
Minu gently took the stylus from Mindy she was using as a rattle.
“You’re worried?” he asked Minu.
“Yes,” she admitted. “I wish it were just nerves or sour grapes, but I don’t trust him. He said some pretty nasty things to the press, and we know he’s been off-world a couple of times.”
“His family’s farm is in the trading consortium,” Dram reminded her. “Hops is a valuable trading commodity.”
“I know,” she said. “Still…” She looked at Mindy for a moment, then came to a decision. “I want a covert Scout team assigned to him.” Dram set his jaw and nodded. “They are only to report. Put good people on it, Dram.”
“Off-world authorization?”
“Unlimited. Damn, I wish Christian were still with us. He was one of the best.”
“We never did find out what happened to him,” Dram said. “His team said he just disappeared one evening while he was on watch. He took a PCR and manually dialed through a portal, so there was no trace.”
Minu nodded absently. She’d read the report. Two teams of Scouts tried to follow his trail but found nothing. He was on the wall, MIA and presumed dead.
“I want the team monitoring Jacob to only report to you and me,” Minu instructed.
“Understood.” He walked over and bent to kiss her on the cheek. “Your father would be very proud of you,” he said, then gently patted Mindy on her tummy. The baby looked up at him curiously.
“Thanks,” Minu said. “I only wish I knew who my father really was,” she added after he left.
* * * * *
Chapter 34
September 6th, 535 AE
Planetary Government Offices, New Moscow, Rusk Capital City, Bellatrix
Minu cursed her luck as she climbed out of the transport, and a pair of Rangers came to attention on either side of the craft. Sergeant Selain was in the rear of the craft, organizing the rest of his detail. “Did you have to bring the whole squad, Sarge?” she asked.
